Stop Playing the Victim

This is another little tough love session. Because it is time to stop playing the victim and stop playing the blame game in your business, and instead start taking responsibility for the failures YOU are responsible for.  

This is a tough one. It’s easy…almost instinctual, when you find yourself in a crappy situation, to immediately jump to “if this person had done that it would be different” or “this just doesn’t work”, or “the economy sucks” or “clients aren’t consistent” or “running a business is too expensive” or “I just got screwed over”. Blame, blame, blame, blame, blame, blame. Blame everyone but yourself, right? And yeah, sometimes those things are absolutely true. You do everything right and crap still happens. BUT, unless you can look back and honestly say, yes I did every single thing right (which is unlikely for most of us, because guess what…we’re human!) then stop trying to blame everything and everyone else for the failures you see around you. This is a negative thought process that’s so easy to get into, and once you start, it’s hard to stop, right? No one wants to admit when they’re wrong. It sucks. It’s kind of embarrassing sometimes. But honestly, it’s also extremely immature and regressive of us to act like we’re never to blame for anything. My 4 year old is figuring this out right now and, while there’s often a big hissy fit involved, will own up to her mistakes most of the time. If a 4 year old can do it, I think you can too.  

It’s easy to blame someone else, isn’t it? I mean, you don’t exactly want to admit that YOU may be the reason your business isn’t successful, or that it’s even flat out failing. But here’s the thing…Do some people not do what they’re supposed to. Of course…and sometimes you’re left holding the bag. But it’s up to you to figure out why, and how to move forward. Yes, some things just don’t work out the way you want to. But again, pick up the pieces and make it work however you can. Yeah, sometimes the economy sucks, but how can you throw out some guerrilla marketing tactics that can still get people to book even when money is tight? Yes, sometimes clients aren’t consistent, but why? What can you do to make more of them be consistent? Yes, running a business can be ridiculously expensive, but it doesn’t have to be. Are all those expenses REALLY necessary to keep your doors open and clients coming in? Probably not. Where can you cut some costs? And yes, some people might screw you over, but that doesn’t mean you’re destined to fail because of it. Ask anyone who’s succeeded if they ever got screwed over…yes, every single one of them has. Pick yourself up and keep going.  

I hear therapists over and over again say things like they’re not successful because they don’t have the money to put into marketing, while simultaneously signing up and promoting every new MLM product they come across. You know what that took….a lot of money. Money that would have been better spent on your primary business and marketing. Your fault! Or therapists will talk about not having the time to market, or the time to take care of this or that for their practice. But those same therapists are often the ones I see constantly on social media, or posting question after questions in Facebook groups, and then doing absolutely NOTHING with the advice given. I’ve tried mentoring numerous therapists who would essentially be handed a layout of exactly what needed to be done for their practice to get more clients and kick start their business…only a month later for them to be asking the same questions and having done absolutely none of it.   

While it can be easy to blame someone or something else for your struggles or failings, sometimes that finger needs to be pointed straight at you instead. Stop with the excuses. Have a little pity party if you need it and then suck it up and get back to work. I know that sounds harsh and some people would probably say it’s mean, but if that’s the worst thing about my advice, then so be it. It’s not the circumstances that define us. It’s how we handle them. It’s in how we respond to stresses that leads to our success or our failure. So, every time you find yourself wanting to point the blame at someone or something else for anything going wrong in your business, big or small, step out of the situation and take a good hard look at the real problem. Is it really something else entirely? If so, how can you handle it to change things? If it’s really you, even partially, what ways can you alter your own actions to change the situation. Because here’s what it boils down to…it doesn’t really matter WHO is at fault. What matters is what you’re going to do about it. Stop blaming. Start doing.